New Historical Perspectives (NHP) is the Royal Historical Society’s book series for early career historians. In late November, the series published its 20th title, the edited collection, Adulthood in Britain and the United States from 1350 to Generation Z.
The series is a partnership between the Society, the Institute of Historical Research and University of London Press. All titles in the series are published in print and online as free Open Access editions, with publishing costs covered by the institutional partners. NHP titles have now been downloaded more than 150,000 times.
In addition to OA publication, the series provides specialist mentoring for its authors, to support the development of PhD research to a first monograph.
In this post we look back on previous titles and forward to new monographs in 2025. We also welcome proposals for future monographs or edited collections from early career historians.
Adulthood in Britain and the United States from 1350 to Generation Z, edited by Maria Cannon and Laura Tisdall, is the latest title in the Society’s New Historical Perspectives (NHP) book series, published by University of London Press. This new collection explores histories and concepts of adulthood with reference to eleven case studies. It’s also the 20th title in the series.
NHP is the Society’s book series for early career scholars (within ten years of their doctorate), commissioned and edited by the Royal Historical Society, in association with University of London Press and the Institute of Historical Research, with additional support from the Economic History Society.
The first title in the series — Edward Owen’s The Family Firm. Monarchy, Mass Media and the British Public, 1932-53 — appeared in late 2019, and first monographs and edited collections, authored or co-edited by early career historians have since appeared regularly.
Monographs range — geographically — from studies of the Caribbean sugar barons and masculinity on the Grand Tour, to transportation on the Western Front, the prelude of the Spanish Civil War and deindustrialisation in late 20th-century Scotland.
Chronologically, the series takes in the margins of medieval London, eighteenth-century court culture, the political map of Victorian Britain, studies of post-war anti-Communism and British cinema culture, and the history of children’s recreation, 1840-2010.
Edited volumes include collections on medieval scholasticism, the Interregnum church and the Old Poor Law.
Three further collections reflect current research interests in comparative histories of gender as identity and daily practice — with surveys of precarity in professional life, the politics of women’s suffrage in international perspective, and global intersections of gender, emotion and power. A final monograph in the series — Sarah Fox’s Giving Birth in Eighteenth-Century England — considers women’s voices to provide new insights on the early modern family and community.
The series was conceived and established in the late-2010s by Officers and Councillors of the Royal Historical Society, led by Peter Mandler, as RHS President (2012-16), and Simon Newman and Penny Summerfield as the first series editors. From the start, NHP was designed to be distinctive, and to address the changing environments in which scholarly writing was produced, consumed and shared.
Since 2019, all NHP titles have been published as free Open Access (OA) editions and print paperback formats. Digital editions of each book increase discoverability and readership, with all 20 titles also now available as Manifold online reading editions. The cost of publishing NHP volumes Open Access is covered by the series partners, not the author or an author’s academic institution.
In addition, New Historical Perspectives appreciates the challenges faced by many early career historians in writing their first monograph at a time of widespread professional uncertainty.
Each author on the NHP programme therefore receives substantial reports from peer reviewers and series editors; is assigned a contact and ‘mentor’ from the editorial board; and takes part in an Author Workshop to discuss a near complete book with invited subject specialists. Author Workshops are opportunities to discuss and develop a manuscript with expert readers before it’s submitted to the publisher.
The Society is very grateful to the institutional partners who have made New Historical Perspectives possible, as well as to those historians who have served as series editors, editorial board members and specialist readers and workshop members since 2019 — as well as the authors who’ve brought their PhD-based research to a new and emerging publishing programme.
The NHP partners are similarly grateful to the Past & Present Society for its generous support in the early years of the project, and subsequently to the Bodleian Library, Oxford, and to those institutional libraries which, as members of the Jisc Open Access Community Framework, have supported the publication of later titles in the series.
Following publication of the 20th title, Adulthood in Britain and the United States from 1350 to Generation Z, NHP looks ahead to further volumes in the new year.
In March 2025, the series continues with Voice, Silence and Gender in South Africa’s Anti-Apartheid Struggle, by Rachel E. Johnson, and — in May — Hannah Jeans’ Reading, Gender and Identity in Seventeenth-Century England.
I’m delighted that the series has reached this significant milestone, and each and every one of the 20 published books represents a major early-career achievement by the authors. Collectively, the books in the series have been downloaded over 150,000 times so far, they’ve received reviews in key journals in their fields and several have been shortlisted for prominent book awards.
At UoL Press, we’re particularly proud that the authors in the series can benefit from the wide reach and readership that open access publication can bring. Our gratitude goes to the RHS and the IHR as series partners, as well as the series editors and editorial board for their invaluable ongoing support for the series.
Emma Gallon, Publisher, University of London Press
If you are interested in publishing with New Historical Perspectives, the Series Editors and Editorial Board welcome proposals via the NHP book proposal form. Applications are invited authors, within 10 years of completing their PhD from a UK or Irish university and who are writing their first monograph.
Proposals may include full-scale monographs and edited collections of up to 100,000 words. The NHP series also publishes shorter monographs (50-60,000 words) where this is an appropriate length for a topic. Completed proposal forms should be submitted to the University of London Press Publisher, Dr Emma Gallon: emma.gallon@sas.ac.uk.
For general enquiries, please also email Emma Gallon at University of London Press: emma.gallon@sas.ac.uk. If you wish to contact the Series’ co-editors directly, please email Professor Elizabeth Hurren (eh140@leicester.ac.uk) or Dr Sarah Longair (slongair@lincoln.ac.uk).